MEDIA/RHETORICAL CRITICISM GUIDE



MEDIA/RHETORICAL CRITICISM GUIDE

Sample: “Entertainment Wars” by Lynn Spigel

See also “Media Criticism” slides

Rhetorical criticism: We engage in a process of thinking about symbols, discovering how they work, why they affect us, and choosing to communicate in particular ways as a result of the options they present.

Rhetorical criticism is the process of systematically investigating and explaining symbolic acts and artifacts for the purpose of understanding rhetorical processes. We explain, investigate and understand symbols and our responses to them.

Rhetorical/Critical Process

Before writing your paper, do your analysis and interpretation using the following guidelines:

1. TEXT

Do a close reading of the speech (or essay, declaration, movie, portrait, etc), taking notes as you go along.

2. CONTEXT

Gather information about the rhetorical situation faced by the speaker (writer, artist, etc.) and, if possible, the reception of the audience.

3. PUZZLE

Identify a puzzle (or irony, paradox, etc.) that you have discovered as a critical reader. This must be something that a critic who is seeking to understand the rhetorical strategy of the text will see as odd. It can be a contradiction found in the text itself, a disjunction between the text and its reception, a disjunction between the text and its professed or presumed purpose, etc.

4. SOLUTION

Come up with some answers to this puzzle. These answers must be found through a close reading of the text. Your solution should be a new reading of the text that solves the puzzle you identified. In your paper, the new reading you develop will help your readers see the text in a different way from how they had previously seen it.

5. THESIS

Compose a thesis statement that includes a broad description of both the puzzle and the solution. It should exist as 3 sentences: a statement of the puzzle, a question that highlights what it is about the puzzle that is odd, and a statement of the solution.

Finally, write your paper.

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